Category: Daily life

The school holidays will be over tomorrow!!!!!!! I am so annoyed that school is starting again because I just got used to the fact of being in pajamas all day. My holidays have been the best holidays I have ever had so far! And I do not want to start school again! I mean I am happy that I get to see my friends again and that my birthday party is only one week away. But I am not ready to go back to school and continue learning. Over the holidays we went swimming with dolphins and seals! Continue reading “School Holidays are Nearly Over!!!!”→

With a weather forecast of 42 degrees today it was promising to become a hot Melbourne Day today. Not the ideal circumstances for a tennis tournament, but Kai signed up so there was no way out. How did he/we survive a day on the tennis court? Continue reading “Surviving a Hot Melbourne Tennis Day”→

After about three months of competition play in a round robin format, Kai’s team in the Associations Junior League made it to the finals as second on the ladder in the 12B division. To determine the actual winner for this season, the first two teams play a finals of four singles and two doubles. And that finals match was happening today.

This weekend is a long weekend in Melbourne – because of a horse race. And while that still sounds weird, it is reason enough for a lot of tennis tournaments to be scheduled in and around Melbourne, most of them across three days.

Since Kai made some big improvements in the last few weeks and months, we decided it was time we try this tournament thing again: the 2017 Better Tennis Frankston Cup. And for the doubles we enlisted the help of Seba, one of his classmates and previous doubles partner.

Halloween is not a part of the Australian culture, but we have seen it grow in the two years that we have lived here. Or maybe our children are teaching us… or we are just finally starting to understand the rules.

But since any excuse is a good excuse to invite friends over for dinner, we have adapted to this new tradition. We made some soup and ‘mummy sausage rolls’, baked one of our almost famous bread from scratch and asked our friends to bring some bites as well. So we ended up with plenty of food, enough to also feed the extra children that we picked up along the way while trick-or-treating.

So what are the rules to Australia Halloween?

You dress up in a costume and knock on the door of houses and say ‘trick or treat’. Don’t forget a big bag to carry your candy in, but also make sure you have a trick up your sleeve to impress people, as they are not expecting that! Or as Kai said, bring an egg and pretend like you will throw it.

You go to the houses that are decorated and leave the others alone – unless you enjoy to see how people are quickly hiding. For anyone out there who thinks they can do that without getting noticed, it is not working! If you decorate your house, that is an open invitation to all kids to come knock on the door for a treat.

How did we do it?

I spent a half day in the kitchen, we gathered at our house with three other families at 5. The three women went out with the six kids and the men stayed at home to warm up the food and give out candy to the trick-or-treaters at the door.

After an hour and a half the group of kids had doubled, the bags were full of candy and we went back to our place to eat the warm treats.

For us it was a great get together with friends that are born in China, Canada, the United Kingdom and Australia.

As we have written before, the kids are keeping up their Dutch through lessons on Saturday. Usually, these are two hours long, and Willemijn and I take a walk on the beach to pass the time. However, once in a while we miss a weekend lesson and, as catch-up, Kai and Luka do Double-Dutch …lesson, that is.

The “downside” to this is that Willemijn and I usually end up at the mall, which is an expensive way to while away four hours. And yesterday was no exception.

Life is busy work. We often spend our days running around, trying to keep up with the hundreds of tasks that we still need to do, too preoccupied to stop and realize what we are on about. Not stopping to enjoy the little things in life.

Well, as they say, realization is the first step to rectification. So, instead of going on like I have, I have decided to take a step back and start enjoying the little things. Like taking my daughter to school.

Culture Shock is the psychological disorientation that most people suffer when they move into a culture that is different from their own. It’s natural and healthy.

-Geert Hofstede-

For us the Australian life style has been very easy to adapt to in many ways. Always people there to give you a helping hand even if you do not ask for it. The easy going life style and having random chats with complete strangers on an almost daily basis. The international background of almost every one you meet.

Living in a new country comes with joys, opportunities and challenges. However one of the things that everyone is bound to experience is culture shock. Life abroad certainly has its ups but at times also has a few downs. Continue reading “Living Abroad and Culture Shock”→

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We are a family of four, with two children aged 9 and 11. In December of 2014, we made the decision to make the big move from the Netherlands to Australia. We turned this plan into reality in June 2015 and re-located to Melbourne, Victoria.